Dakota defeats L'Anse Creuse North in football

Dakota’s football team took away whatever momentum L’Anse Creuse North had heading into halftime.

And the Cougars never let up off the gas.

Trailing 10-7 after two quarters, Dakota scored 35 points in the second half and cruised to a 42-17 win over the Crusaders in a Division 1 district final on Friday night.

“Having the momentum is huge,” said Dakota coach Mike Giannone, who guided the Cougars to their third district title in four seasons. “That’s one of the things we told our kids at half, if we could kind of calm them down a little because they came in with a lot of belief, that we could win this game. That’s a team that can score points at will, but our defense had an answer tonight.”

Dakota, which has won 10 straight since losing in the season opener to Dearborn Fordson, will face Lake Orion in a regional final next Friday. The Dragons advanced with a 10-7 win over Eisenhower.

“They came out with a whole lot of fire,” Giannone said. “They’re a pretty good football team and did some great things in the first half. I think we just wore them down a bit. Our guys, I’m not going to say were surprised because we know what they do down the street, they’re only a mile away so there isn’t much difference in the kids.”

Dakota scored on back-to-back drives to begin the second half.

The first score came on a four-yard run from Nick Cattaneo, which was followed by a six-yard pass from Richmon Render to Matt Crossley to give the Cougars a 21-10 lead.

The second TD was set up by a fumble recovery by Tony Balabani on LCN’s first play from scrimmage.

“Getting into the end zone on that first drive was our priority in the second half,” Render said. “That got the momentum going back for us. Then we scored again, which just gave us more confidence.”

The Crusaders’ Vincenzo Parratto tried to slow down Dakota’s momentum with a one-yard plunge with just over a minute left in the third quarter, but it didn’t last long as Crossley took the next handoff from Render 57 yards to build the Cougars’ lead back to 11.

“We knew if we lost today we weren’t going to be putting our pads on again,” said Cattaneo, who was on last year’s squad that was shutout by Eisenhower in a pre-district game. “We didn’t want to go home and have our season end.”

Nicko Savich and Cattaneo each scored on short runs in the fourth quarter to seal the Cougars’ win.

“It’s simple, they’ve been here for a long time, they understand what to do,” said LCN coach Anthony Kiner, who led the Crusaders to their first playoff win in school history last week. “They go to districts and win. We haven’t learned that yet. We learned how to win in the playoffs for the first time.”

In the first half, the Crusaders’ offense was near perfect led by junior quarterback Sean Koski.

Koski finished the first quarter going 11-for-12 passing for 70 yards and had a nine-yard rushing TD. His only blemish came after completing his first seven passes with his eighth attempt being picked off by Connor Wonsowicz.

After back-to-back drives that didn’t result in a first down for LCN, Koski got the offense going again hooking up with his favorite receiver, Tyler Conklin, from the Crusaders’ 17 to Dakota’s 45. Nine plays later, Mitchell Peer booted a 33-yard field goal with 58.7 seconds left before halftime.

Koski was 17-of-23 for 143 yards in the first half.

Dakota’s only points of the first half came on an 88-yard kickoff return from Mustafa Abdur-Rahman going into the end zone untouched.

Rahman also had two interceptions, while Ryan Weber and Brandon Lozon each recovered fumbles.

“We haven’t been here before and it showed, too many mistakes,” Kiner said. “You can’t give up a kickoff return for a touchdown and that’s just us not being here. We’re learning. They had a game plan and stuck to it and did a really good job at it.”

Kiner inherited a program that came into the season on a 19-game losing streak and guided it to a 7-3 finish.

“I want to say hats off to LCN, after not winning a game for over two years to getting to the second round of the playoffs, that’s amazing,” Render said.